According to folks like Dr. Christopher Mackie, governments are shortchanging people under 45 by spending an unequal amount on seniors. Unsurprisingly, Susan Eng of the Canadian Association of Retired Persons (CARP) believes that such a position amounts to nothing short of “inter-generational war”. Co-operatives empower people around the world to redefine, share and creatively distribute wealth in order to make our communities healthy and resilient for the long term. No matter what side of 45 you find yourself on. Here are five co-operative solutions to inter-generational strife.

Reciprocal mentorship

We need to evolve our understanding of mentorship. Organizational Psychologist Adam Grant thinks that inter-generational mentoring is about more than advising someone how to follow in your footsteps:

At Vancity Credit Union, our Community Leader Internship Program encourages peer and reverse mentorship (in addition to the classic model of an experienced leader imparting wisdom on a more junior employee). Digital savvy recent graduates mentor executives on crafting compelling social profiles. Newcomers to the Lower Mainland cultivate personal resilience in others by sharing their journeys to their new communities. Co-operative mentorship cultivates and connects people from multiple generations to share and shift perspectives, which is something desperately needed in the world today.

Worker buyouts

According to HBR’s Peter Walsh, Michael Peck and Ibon Zugatsi, the world needs more worker-owned enterprises in order to bridge the societal gaps between the ultra-wealthy and everyone else. Baby Boomers own nearly half of the privately held businesses in the United States (enterprises of 20 or fewer people make up over 90% of the economy in North America). Members of the Millennial and Gen Z community are eager to carve out space in this economic landscape, but often lack the capital to make an entrance. Clearly there is a huge opportunity to align an awesome societal transfer of wealth with a new generation of ownership because over half of Baby Boomer small business owners plan to retire in the next decade and their employees want to keep their jobs. Melissa Hoover, Executive Director of the Democracy at Work Institute, calls this phenomena “the silver tsunami” – with its rich co-operative history, Italy is a leader in worker buyouts, and we should be bringing such transitions to life in our communities as we experience the same demographic shifts.

Here are some details about the worker buyout process from The Hive:

An employee buy-out is the process by which ownership of a business is transferred to its employees. This can take many forms, from wholly employee-owned co-operative businesses [to] employee share schemes where employees own a minority stake in the business.

Most – if not all – Baby Boomer small business owners began their enterprise with the purpose of adding value to their local communities. Walsh, Peck and Zugatsi make a sound, inter-generationally-connective business case for worker buyouts:

First, renewed interest in ensuring the economic viability of local communities suggests that Baby Boomer owners about to retire are increasingly likely to want to sell to workers. Second, evidence is mounting that worker- and employee-owned enterprises outperform their competitors, especially during economic downturns… Third, as a result of strong performances by worker- and employee-owned companies, it is becoming easier for workers to overcome arguably the biggest hurdle to worker buyouts: financing.

The co-operative solution of worker buyouts transfers and shares wealth in service of generational needs and community wellbeing.

Accessible #platformcoops

Platform co-operativism represents opportunities to align inter-generational mentorship and the creation of producer and worker co-ops (sometimes buyouts). Platform co-operativism “is about cloning the technological heart of online platforms and puts it to work with a cooperative model, one that puts workers, owners, communities, and cities – in a kind of solidarity that leads to political power.” Platform co-ops, Keith Parkins argues, are differentiated from winner-take-all, “Death Star” platforms, like Uber or Airbnb, for the following reason: “the central premise of platform co-operativism is that those who create the most value for the platforms – providers like drivers and hosts – should own and control the platforms.”

From cleaning services to stock photo libraries, platform co-ops present a more inclusive and equitable alternative to value-extracting business models that have come to define the gig economy. The two main differences between the platform co-op model and the gig economy model are democratic governance and broad-based platform ownership, which naturally includes folks from nearly all generations, geographies and socio-economic status.

Distributed prosperity

Traditional capitalist business models consolidate wealth and power in the hands of a small amount of people – while folks like Mark Zuckerberg are celebrated as leaders of the corporate youth movement, most people benefitting from this model skew Boomer. Co-ops offer a more inclusive and scalable approach to business, which is why Start.Coop wants to create more of them:

In this age of corporate consolidation where the barriers to entry have only increased, co-ops create economies of scale for economically disadvantaged groups such as women, minorities, immigrants, family businesses, and veterans. By design, co-ops bring ownership and economic power to their shareholders whether that be through shared profits, higher wages or lower costs. And by joining together, co-op members can create access to products, services or markets not otherwise available.

Co-operatives share the wealth throughout nearly every sector of the economy and serve stakeholders across all generations. One of the most staggering inter-generational challenges facing Canada is elder care, which the National Task Force on Elder Care addressed nearly a decade ago:

Given the scope of the issue, its relevance to a major segment of the population, and the increasing demand for services, it is not an exaggeration to say that the formation of a co-op elder care program at a national level would rival the significance of the co-op housing sector in its potential for service to Canadians and their communities.

In order for humanity to share our incredible societal wealth we need to work more co-operatively across all sectors and industries.

Ownership re-imagined

Born in 1981, I’m at the spearhead of the Millennial Movement – some colleagues refer to me as an “Elder Millennial”. My generation is coming to terms with ownership of land, cars and space in very interesting ways. Some of us know that such things are unattainable unless global economics change substantially. Some of us believe that owning land is paramount to theft and that we must find other options. Many of us are more interested in sharing cars and bikes because it’s more important to have access to transportation or living space than it is to owning such things. According to my heroes at the New Economic Foundation (NEF), owning the future is going to look very different and will probably be more co-operative:

Addressing these problems will require more than tinkering. We will need to transform the economic institutions that generate today’s unequal, unsustainable and dysfunctional economic outcomes, such as how firms are owned and governed. Central to this must therefore be a 21st century enterprise agenda that democratizes the ownership and control of business. This is because how businesses are owned – who has distributional and control rights within the firm and also who captures the value they add – vitally shapes how they operate, in whose interests, over what time horizon, and how they distribute their profits. In turn this determines the nature of enterprise and the distribution of economic power and reward in society.

One specific thing or way will not be enough to re-imagine ownership and democratize the economy. According to the folks at NEF, “what is required is a pluralistic and proactive strategy to scale alternative models of ownership that can reorientate enterprise towards the common good, shape production toward democratic needs, stem financial leakage and build a future of shared economic plenty by sharing the rewards of our collective economic endeavours.”

With a track record of creating value that is resilient and sustainable for the long term, co-operatives will be at the heart of this transformation that will serve all generations across pretty much every kind of community.

This article was originally published October 12, 2018.

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